Marvel Entertainment Universe

 In the last blog we discussed the background and history of Marvel studios, in this blog we are going to do a SWOT analysis of the cinematic giant.

Strengths 

Marvel Entertainment is a geographically diverse company, operating successfully domestically and internationally. The company runs a diversified business mainly from its three divisions of Publishing which publishes, markets and sells comic books and novels about various Marvel characters. In addition to publishing over 4000 Marvel books and magazines in 30 languages for the next generation of fans, Marvel Comics are now being added to e-book service Scribd, along with Amazon owned Comixology, to include Young Adult and Middle Grade novels based on Avengers, Guardians of the Galaxy and Spiderman franchises as well as kids and family friendly apps. Licensing provides rights to movies, production companies, producers of video games (like Activision, Nintendo and Sony) and also the rights to manufacturers of various types of merchandise Marvel owns allowing the use of its character, as well as overseeing how the characters are used. Movie Production segment was started to produce films in house which would allow Marvel to retain revenues increasing their bottom line. Marvel Studios produced Iron Man in 2008, it earned over $585 million for a worldwide gross, although being its first movie to be made. The Studio had a gigantic support of its Comic Fans which is evident even now after Avenger’s Endgame became the top grossing movie of all time.

Weaknesses

Marvel’s main focus is to dominate the cartoons and comics market which can be seen as a weakness because of their limited market. Their target audience mainly consists of boys in their teens ad tweens which makes them dependent in that specific region for success. Their products will depend on how that specific market responds and their attachment to those products. Here, Power of the Customer is higher. Their merchandise is limited to action figures, not to shirts, keychains etc. These products can be sold as fake by non-marvel shops using their logo and name which can affect their assurance of quality if they are not copyright struck.